1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an electronic device having a transmission/reception function for e-mail and a method of displaying e-mail, and particularly to an electronic device and method which display an unread state and an already read state of the e-mail in a suitable manner.
2. Description of the Related Art
Currently, electronic devices such as personal computer, cellular phones, etc., have come to be in common use. Also, e-mail functions, which are installed in such electronic devices, have come to be in common use, leading to a situation in which a great amount of e-mails are transmitted and received.
There is a function for e-mail whereby a document file or an image file can be transmitted in the form of an attached, file attached to the message body. Currently, the performance of electronic devices such as cellular phones etc. has improved, which allows various types of fries to be attached. Also, there are an increasing number of situations in which an e-mail is transmitted with a file attached to the message body. The content of the attached file can be checked by performing a predetermined operation when the user checks the message body, for example.
As a display example whereby e-mails (received e-mails) can be checked, summaries of the e-mails can be displayed in the form of a list.
In a case in which a great number of summaries of received mails are displayed in the form, of a list, in some cases, unread mails, which have not been checked, and already read mails, which have been already checked, are displayed on a display in a mixed manner. Conventional techniques have been disclosed in which the summaries of received mails are displayed such that the unread e-mails and the already read mails can be easily distinguished (see Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 2005-32052, for example).
In conventional techniques, after the message body of a received mail is displayed, the user is regarded to have checked the content of the received mail, and the mail is displayed on a display such that this mail can be identified as an already read mail. Accordingly, whether or not the content of an attached file has been checked is not taken into consideration in particular. In this case, all the items of the e-mail are regarded as already having been read, even in a case in which the content of the attached file has not been checked.
Accordingly, determination cannot be made based upon the received mail list display screen whether or not a given attached file has been reproduced. In order to determine whether or not the user has checked the content of a given attached file, after the performance of an operation for displaying the details of each nail, the user must check the content of the attached file by inputting predetermined processing.
Furthermore, currently, there are many situations in which various types of files are transmitted in the form of attached files using electronic devices such as cellular phones, etc. Accordingly, there is a demand for a technique which allows the user to easily check the state of whether or not the content of each attached file has been checked.
The present invention has been made in view of such situations. It is an object of the present invention to provide an electronic device and a method which are capable of allowing the user to easily identify whether or not the user has checked the content of an attached file, in addition to whether or not the user has checked the massage body, with respect to received mails having data in the form of an attached file.